Chapter 53 House of Jester Night #3
I avert my eyes to the female prisoners scurrying to the sentinels with pleading hands, begging them with tears bulging from their eyes and hysterical voices.
Niklaus loops an arm around my waist and lifts me to my feet. The show shuts down. The fire ceases its explosive fireworks. The strange music scrapes to a stop. And the multitude of inmates are ants trying to outrun a tsunami of rain with nowhere to go.
“What’s going on?” I ask.
“Everyone gets punished, I think.” He holds me close, strokes my back. “Consequences of not fighting to the death.”
“But that’s not fair!” I shrink away from the sentinels jabbing us with rods to join the others.
The stadium is drained of its entertainment. Like cattle being herded from one enclosed space to the next, whips are lashing across the backs of stragglers, and bull hooks are poking those who resist.
So, we follow behind Jack who seems to know the best ways to blend in and stay out of trouble.
“Are you angry with me?” Niklaus asks.
“Always.”
But I can still taste that kiss. And I’m not sure where it came from. We had that talk in the cave. We were in agreement. I feel so twisted and uneasy over the new desire that draws me into him.
“Good because I meant what I said,” he replies coldly.
I flick my gaze to him, sticking out my jaw. “Are you fucking kidding me?”
“I stand by not warning your father.”
Even though Niklaus has always shown me his true character, that of an incessant, insecure bully…why did I think things were different now? I am an idiot for even feeling that sting of betrayal.
“Even after kissing me?” I ask. My voice sounds so small. So defeated. And I am ashamed of myself for letting him have any control over these intimate feelings that are quickly being erased.
Niklaus stares ahead. “That kiss didn’t change anything for me. I only did it hoping the Ringmaster would find that more entertaining than the fighting.”
My thoughts fracture. One section mourning, and the other plotting. My immediate spike of anger isn’t loud—it’s ice cold. I cut my stare into him with wide eyes. There are absolutely no words to explain to him what that sentiment means to me…
It’s humiliation strangled by utter disbelief.
This fury coils low in my stomach, crouching and waiting patiently for the right thing to say.
And as Niklaus finally shifts his attention down to me on the long march to our punishment, through the creepy prison halls—he waits for me to reply.
Those unfeeling, indifferent blue eyes do a quick examination of my expression, trying to identify what I’m thinking.
But my stillness is deceptive.
I do not give a fuck about him anymore.
And he’ll never know that I did.
When we finally get back, I will never speak to him again.
Screams break me out my blood-boiling trance. The sentinels at the back of the herd are burning prisoners with torches to get the line to move faster.
After running and leaping over inmates who have tripped—we arrive at the community showers. The room fills up beyond capacity standards. Jack is separated from us, jostled away from the hysterical group.
“Get to a wall!” he shouts to us.
People begin fighting, punching, kicking, and throwing the weight of their bodies into getting away from the center of the circle.
I yelp as an elbow flies into my temple.
My feet are being trampled. Shoulders slam into my back.
I’m being thrown from side to side by caged animals, stampeding in every direction.
“Sapphire!” Niklaus shouts as he torn away from me. He reaches his hand out, and that’s the last I see as a stray fist plows right into my nose. Blood springs free, dripping down my mouth.
“Damnit!” I hiss.
A man tries to use my body to jump over the crowd, taking me to the ground.
I land on my back but quickly flip over to protect my vital organs.
Feet step on me, kick the back of my head, stomp on my shoulders—and there’s nowhere to seek shelter.
I can’t even lift myself off the ground.
It’s an endless beat down. My only hope is to crawl through the brief open spaces.
I scurry on my elbows and slither along the damp, scummy floor. Rolling, twisting and shimming through legs, and around jammed areas of fighting inmates.
Get to a wall.
Get to a wall.
Get to a wall.
After getting a knee to the cheekbone, I run my fingertips along the rocky dark gray wall.
With a sigh of relief, I claw my way up its jagged terrain to stand up.
Men and women shriek and cry to be let out of the center of the showers, but the room is so packed, there is no escape.
I’m plastered to the wall, wedged between two younger men who are shielding their faces.
What the fuck is going to happen? Ice water? Poison? Are they going to kill us?
A man and a woman kiss, then hold each other in tears.
No. They’re going to kill us, aren’t they?!
“Niklaus!” I screech. But I can’t see him through the great mass of bodies surrounding me. Tears spring to my eyes. What if this is it? We both die here? Fifty years in the past? And we don’t even get to say goodbye?
A Guardian, a member of the Blood family, eclipses the room like a dark curtain pulled over a window, smirking as he toys with a lever.
“Devietzx né l?evitz quinxcéitz!”
The room erupts in a nuclear blast of panic and terror.
The lever is pulled.
And just before pipes burst with steaming water, Niklaus shoulders his way through the crowd to me. In a forceful thrust, he throws his body against me, slamming his hands down on the wall of either side of my head. He encloses me in, blocking the sudden downpour that beats down his back and head.
The sounds of the room drastically morph from terror to agony.
But it all blends into the background as Niklaus screams.
And he doesn’t stop screaming.
Residual drops and a fine mist scorch my arms and the sides of my calves. Boiling water mixed with something. Not as potent as acid, but a chemical that leaves a mephitic odor and lasting burn.
I squeeze my eyes shut, in misery as I can feel the Nightlung floating closer to the surface. I reach for it. The fingers of my mind curl around nothing. Please! I beg for it to take us somewhere safe. Home. Home. Home. Please bring us back to our families!
But this mysterious entity is like a black cat, coming and going as it pleases. Losing interest the more I want it to let me near.
I give up on traveling momentarily. Never have I heard such a terrifying sound in my life. Niklaus’s screams will echo through my nightmares until my final days.
I watch the skin on his shoulders bubble in horror.
“Niklaus!” I cry. Because, what else can I do? Is this going to kill him and spare me?
Oh god. I try again, reaching for that cosmic mist in the back of my mind, forcing myself to break whatever unwanted barrier or block is restraining me from controlling this.
I slide my hands along his jaw and let him press his forehead against mine. His howls come between his clenched teeth now as he bears down.
“I’m here!” I hold him against me. “Hold on, okay? Hold on!”
People around us drop to their knees, flopping on the floor like bugs being burned by the light from a magnifying glass. But Niklaus holds his position against me, and despite the excruciating pain, he doesn’t waver. Not for a second.